Transformation Space - Marianne de Pierres [11]
Tekton nodded his appreciation.
‘Good luck, mate,’ said the bursar and hurried onto his ship.
Tekton’s minds considered options while he waited for the trader ship to slip dock. He could go to the station master and request assistance, but with the station in utter chaos it was unlikely he’d be heard. That option also meant he risked an encounter with Farr.
Or he could pay his way onto this hybrid and take what fate brought him. If the Extros were indeed coming, a biozoon might be a safer option than an OLOSS military ship or a mercenary vessel. Biozoons were rumoured to trade with the Post-Species.
All he needed was to get himself, and the DSD that pressed so uncomfortably against his ribs, out of this system. He could make different travel arrangements from the next place he docked. He would wait. Yes. That was best.
Stepping back near the frame of a loader, he grasped its hydraulic arm and held on. The structure shook as ships peeled from their moorings in quick succession, hurrying from the station.
In an absurdly short amount of time, Tekton was alone on the dock and the vibrations had stopped. It was eerie and surreal; just him and the rows of automated loaders.
He wondered, irrationally, if he was the last left here.
Ridiculous, snapped logic-mind. Not enough ships to get them all off.
How can you be sure? challenged free-mind.
Tekton let them bicker while he concentrated on his breath and attempted a meditative manner.
At inhalation three hundred or so, he heard a noise. Glancing up, he saw the scarred grey belly of a biozoon descending through one of the docking channels. It set down heavily into the mooring, as though worn out with the effort.
For the briefest flicker Tekton thought it was the Baronessa Fedor’s biozoon, the one he’d seen docked at Rho Junction, but upon inspection it was smaller and less impressive. The restrained cephalic fins and generally degraded appearance confirmed the bursar’s statement that it was a hybrid. From what Tekton knew of biozoons, hybrids tended to lose their condition, especially those who fell into the hands of less considerate operators.
Tekton quickly reached inside his suit and shifted the DSD so that the telltale bulge lay at his back.
The egress scale peeled open, and an ’esque climbed out onto a set of rungs crudely pegged to the biozoon’s skin.
Wait, both minds warned him simultaneously. Don’t approach him.
He listened to them. Samuelle’s combat suit could be interpreted as threatening, and he noted that the ’esque carried a weapon. Tekton didn’t wish to test the suit’s weapon resistance ability. It was, after all, Samuelle’s spare.
The ’esque stopped just short of him, giving him a slow appraisal. At the same time a grey-skinned Balol emerged from the egress scale and began to climb down.
‘You the welcoming party?’ asked the ’esque.
Tekton slid back the suit hood and showed his face. He and the ’esque were of similar height and both lightly built. Tekton, of course, had the advantage of wearing combat protection but even so the man’s casual demeanour unnerved him; his pale eyes were not unlike Lasper Farr’s.
‘Of a sort, sir,’ Tekton said. ‘It’s been recommended that I seek passage on your ship. I’d be happy to pay a generous fee, of course.’
The man scowled. His skin was as pale as his eyes, giving him the look of one of the nocturnal races or that of a perennial space traveller.
‘Recommended by whom?’
‘The last ship leaving,’ said Tekton a little ruefully. ‘My decision to leave my own billet was rather last-moment. It seems that passage has become rather hard to acquire, due to … circumstances.’
‘Circumstances!’ The ’esque snorted out a laugh. ‘Ilke, you hear that? These are circumstances.’
The Balol sauntered up and stopped alongside her companion. Unlike him, she was stocky and muscular, and wore no clothing other than her natural grey skin plating to cover the fact that she was female.
Tekton couldn’t help but examine her with interest. He had heard that Balol females made energetic, though often violent, lovers,